Tyhee’s Nicholas Lake shows promise (October 19, 2007)

Tyhee Developments (TDC-V) Nicholas Lake Main Zone reported significant gold intersections as well as economically viable tungsten values, the company says.

The results bring Tyhee one step closer to making a decision about whether it can mine Nicholas Lake as an open-pit resource.

Additional assay results from Tyhees re-sampling program demonstrated both narrow high-grade zones as well as broader lower-grade gold zones.

Gold assays revealed 26.98 grams per tonne gold over 2.7 metres in Hole N059, 9.22 grams per tonne gold over 5.5 metres in N066 and 3.71 grams per tonne gold over 17.5 metres in N063.

I was expecting it if it wasnt there I would have been surprised, Tyhees president and chief executive Dave Webb told The Northern Miner.

Tyhee has spent the last year re-logging and re-sampling core from 120 drill holes on the Nicholas Lake Main Zone. The majority of the core is historic. Of the 120 drill holes, only six holes were drilled this year and eight in 2005.

The last batch of assay results from the re-sampling and re-logging exercise is due within the next four weeks.

We have found a lot of gold values that hadnt been detected because they had never been sampled, Webb says. We should have the final drill hole assays soon. Well see whether we have an open-pit resource hopefully by no later than the end of the year.

An open-pit mine at Nicholas Lake could be combined with the existing open-pit resource at the companys Ormsby Zone, 8 km to the south, resulting in a much more cost-effective mining operation, the company says.

The Nicholas Lake deposit has 300 metres of strike length and 350 metres of depth. Says Webb: If we average 30 metres of mineralization at 3 grams gold per tonne, that equals a million oz. of gold. Thats what were looking for.

Now Tyhee is tying up the belt snapping up as many properties as it can in the area. Currently the company says it is the largest property owner in the gold belt. We want to get all the deposits in the Yellowknife Gold Belt, Webb says. Were looking for everything.

Nicholas Lake Main Zone is one of two zones on Tyhees Yellowknife Gold Project. The Yellowknife Gold Project consists of 62.6 sq. km of mining leases located 90 km north of Yellowknife. The property hosts Nicholas Lake Main Zone, the Ormsby Zone and the West Zone.

A report filed on Sedar in July 2006 stated that the Yellowknife Gold Project has a 1 million oz. measured and indicated gold resource.

Webb has had a long history with Nicholas Lake. As a student, Webb worked as a replacement geologist every summer in Yellowknife and came across surface showings of mineralization in the Nicholas Lake area. He staked 4 sq. km. of the land himself, later optioning it to Chevron.

Chevron brought in Athabasca Gold Resources. But after Athabasca completed its earn in, Chevron decided that Nicholas Lake wasnt big enough so it sold its interest to Athabasca. In the late 1980s, Royal Oak Mines picked up the project. But it ran into troubles and didnt maintain the original option agreement on the property.

Webb still had a royalty on the property and when Royal Oak stopped paying it, he put them in default and the property reverted back to him in 2000 under an order by the Superior Court of Ontario.

Webb sold his property to Tyhee for a quarter of a million dollars in January 2001.

Meanwhile, the lastest assay results show signs of economically significant tungsten. The results indicated concentrations such as 0.625% tungsten over 4.5 metres in N066 and 0.131% tungsten over 35.2 metres in N064.

The tungsten values are going to be dug up [along with the gold] whether we like it or not, Webb says. If its an open pit youre going to be digging that up anyway.

Webb says the value of tungsten is about $250 per metric tonne per unit. That works out to be about $25 per kilogram. And if 70-80% of that can be recovered, he argues, then tungsten might be of some economic value.

If youre getting an additional $10 or $15 value in recovered tungsten per tonne of rock, thats almost like an additional gram of gold per tonne, he points out. No one would build a tungsten mine at those values, but since were crushing the rock anywayits economically significant and its worth looking at.